RELIABILITY GROWTH MODELING OF A COMPLEX SYSTEM

Acquisition Category (ACAT) Level I programs are held to a mandated reliability growth requirement by the Milestone Decision Authority (MDA). Many times, ACAT Level I programs do not have the data required prior to going to test in order to assess and determine the requirement posed on them by the MDA. Most times, due to the complexity of the ACAT Level I program, there is not a comparable program in which to use its data. While there are existing methods that assess reliability growth, they require having failure data available. Due to the complexity of ACAT Level I programs, having the type of data available early in the program’s schedule is usually not possible. Therefore, the existing methods do not work to answer the mandated requirement posed on such complex programs. To overcome this challenge, a design methodology was developed to exhibit the results of reliability growth for ACAT Level I programs. This thesis (1) prepares data gathered from the program's documents as an input to the AMSAA PM2-C model to develop a baselined reliability growth planning curve, (2) produces a demonstrated reliability growth curve, and then (3) compares the baselined planning curve to the demonstrated reliability growth curve. These tasks are captured within the design methodology, which is presented as a repeatable process applicable to ACAT Level I programs. Executing the series of steps in this thesis fulfills the mandated requirement posed by the MDA with fidelity. http://archive.org/details/reliabilitygrowt1094564131 Civilian, Department of the Navy Approved for public release; distribution is unlimited.